The Space Shuttle Program Disasters

Tragedies

Challenger's STS-51L mission was the first shuttle liftoff scheduled for Launch Pad 39B at NASA's Kennedy Space Center. There were a couple technical and weather-related delays, but Challenger launched at 11:38 am on January 28th, 1986. About 72 seconds into the flight there was a massive burning of the hydrogen that was streaming from the failed bottom tank. Faced with harsh aerodynamic loads, the Challenger splintered into pieces above the Atlantic Ocean a second later. It was later revealed that a seal, called an O-ring, on the right solid booster rocket had failed at liftoff, which allowed pressurized gas to escape from inside the booster. The material impinged on the strut connection the solid rocket booster to the Challengers external tank, which caused both piece of hardware to fail. A review determined that cold weather contributed to the failure of the O-ring seal. It was concluded by NASA that the shuttle was not safe to launch at such low temperatures.

Columbia's 28th space mission was designated as STS-107 and the launch took place on January 16th, 2003 with a crew of seven. 80 seconds into the launch, a piece of foam split from the Shuttle's propellant tank and hit the edge of the shuttle's left wing. The collision was seen by mission control, but engineers could not pinpoint the location and extent of the damage. Similar incidents had occurred on three prior launches without causing any critical damage so NASA management did not address Columbia's concerns. On the morning of February 1st Columbia re-entered the atmosphere. It was not until 8:53, at an altitude of 231,000 feet and a speed of 23 times the speed of sound, that trouble began to show. The left wings heat resistant tiles had been damaged and due to that heat and air entered the left wing ripping it off. At 9 am the shuttle disintegrated over southeast Texas. In the aftermath of the Columbia disaster, the space shuttle program was grounded until July 26, 2005.